July 17, 2007 Biocolumn

Our ecocolumn is still striving the aquatic system is still clear. The tadpole is fat and happy.? He looked me straight in the eye this morning probably wondering why we put him in this wonderful contraction. The minnow is swimming low to the bottom probably looking for a bit to eat. The duck weed is still a vibrant green floating mystically on the top of the water. The decomposition chamber has a little condensation around the chamber and the piece and the banana is growing mold rapidly. There is micro organisms growing on one of the branches in the terrian chamber.

STUDENT BOG SITE

The following blog site(listed below) is user friendly for students. One of the teachers in our MSP class recommended it. Students could blog their observations and comments about the ecocolumns and respond to each others' comments. I think that this would be an excellent LITERACY COMPONENT to the science classroom.

http://www.haranbanjo.com:16080/kidzblog/
This site has a user guide. You can manage up to ten blogs without registering.

Ecocolumn July 16, 2007

Our biocolumn is still vibrant. There is mold growing in the decomposition chamber on the banana peel. The water in the aquatic chamber is clear now. The condensation has lessened. There is a new tadpole in the aquatic chamber. The plant live is still thriving and has produces so new root systems. Some of the other plant life has started to die.

ECOCOLUMN UPDATE

Amazingly the life in our aquatic chamber appears healthy and happily swimming through the lush vegetation. In fact, the wonder of life has occurred and we have a new tadpole. The water has cleared as expected and all the plants show new growth. Small particles of dirt have seeped through the holes in the bottle cap and have entered the aquatic chamber.
Happily condensation continues to form within the the chambers. This transpiration is essential for our column to continue. A piece of banana peel was placed into the decomposing chamber. Mold spores are beginning to form on the peel.
Unfortunately we were unable to locate the bug that was placed in the terrestrial chamber three days ago. Our plants have started to wilt. We added some water into this chamber to help prevent them from dying.

Day 5 July 16

We didn't get a chance to check our ecosystem on Thursday or Friday, which means that it has been on its own for four days. Today, we should be able to notice if anything is negatively affecting it. I was concerned about the amount of algae present in the water when we started it.
It is now 9:00 in the morning. We have observed that the condensation in the container is not blocking our view of the ecosystem anymore. There is condensation in each layer, but not as much. The water has cleared up in the aquatic ecosystem. The fish are very active and there is not as much algae present. The plant material in the ecosystem is helping clean the water. The decomposition layer now has mold growing on the banana peel. There is a fair amount of condensation in this layer. I think the condensation is occurring during the decomposition process, but I am not sure. A few of the plants are dying in the terrestrial layer. I don't think we buried the roots into the soil deep enough.

Day Two

Day Two Observations

Today we noticed that all of our chambers had condensation within them. The aquatic and decomposition chambers had more condensation than the terrestrial chamber. All of our creatures are still alive in the aquatic chamber also. Our plants look healthy. Today we added a 1 cm land bug into our aquatic chamber.

DayTwo of Ecocolumn

Today we observed our ecocolumn and found that it had some condensation forming in the chambers. The air hole had no condensation around them and we assessed that to the fact of temperature change. The water level was measured at 10 cm in height. The animal life was still alive and kicking. The plant leaves were folded up but remained green in color. I look forward to seeing what tomorrow brings.

Day Two July 11

Today, we observed our eco-column to notice changes that have occurred. The biggest change that was evident is the amount of condensation throughout the column. Since the system is partially closed, the water that has evaporated or transpired from the plants is collecting on the sides of the bottle. It is difficult to see inside of the column due to the amount of condensation present. We added a small land bug to the terrestrial ecosystem today. It is bright green and can fly. It is about 1 cm in length.

Day One Ecosystem

Day One

To construct the ecosystem you need the following supplies:

• five clean two-liter bottles with caps
• scissors
• push pin or awl
• clear tape
• soil, water, plants, compost, small snails, spiders, worms, etc

The directions for constructing the system can be found in my MSP EARTH Science binder or in the book Bottle Biology.

Our aquatic layer contained water from the Mandeville Water Treatment outdoor water garden. We also included 2 minnows, a snail, duckweed, and other aquatic vegetation. In our composting layer we had layers of soil and humus. Our top terrestrial layer contained soil and several small plants. We then placed our ecosystem in a window careful to avoid direct sunlight.

Building an Ecosystem

Building an Ecosystem

Building an ecosystem will enable students to define observe a working unit made up of organisms interacting with each other and with other nonliving factors. This is an excellent activity for meeting the fifth grade grade-level expectations for Unit 5 Ecosystems.

The following website has excellent directions for constructing an ecocolumn along with detailed lesson ideas.

http://www.tolweb.org/treehouses/?treehouse_id=3152

Ecocolumns

We created ecocolumn in class. This is a great way to use cooperative grouping and engage your students in your science class. I have used the bottle biology in my classroom and have had great success with it. The two problems I have incurred was lack of space and limited time. I look forward to the results.

Creating an eco-column is a great way to get kids interested and involved in learning about ecosystems first hand. In the fifth grade comprehensive curriculum, Unit 5 on Ecosystems, there is an opportunity to use eco-columns. Students set up an ecosystem and try to keep it balanced for two weeks. Once they have made many observations and are able to recognize the living and non-living components of an ecosystem, they try to pollute it or see what happens if they remove one of the essential components of the ecosystem. I am anxious to see how everyone's ecocolumns evolve over time. This will give me valuable information for helping my students understand what is happening in their own ecosystems.

Observation: Day One--we have a tadpole, two minnows, and a snail in the aquatic part of our ecosystem. In addition, we have some duckweed and submerged aquatic vegetation. Unfortunately, we have lots of algae that will probably negatively affect the amount of dissolved oxygen in the bottom of the eco-column over time. We will see.....
In the second layer, we have a composting layer with layers of soil, humus, and more soil. We also have a small larva of some sort. We have plants in the terrestrial layer and are ready to go! It looks healthy today!